Model of thermo-hydro-mechanical coupling for cracked rock mass and its 2D FEM analysis

The Barton-Bandis model and the Oda’s crack tensor theory were combined for application in computation and analysis of coupled thermo-hydro-mechanical processes in saturated-unsaturated cracked rock mass,and a 2D FEM program was developed.Through the computation examples the distributions and the variation of the stress fields,the pore pressure fields and the temperature fields of the rockmasses with and without cracks were compared.It was shown that because of existence of the discontinuities the stiffness of the original rockmass was weakened and the leakage of the rockmass raised,so that the stress concentration level in the cracked mass decreased and the flow velocities increased,therefore the heat from the heat source could be transferred to the surrounding zones by the water flow quickly,and the magnitudes of the temperature and the negative pore pressures in the rockmass were comparatively low.